Pecan Chewies and a Give Away!

Don't you love it when you find a recipe that you absolutely love? It can be the most simple recipe, with ingredients you have in your fridge and pantry, but it just knocks your socks off!

That is exactly what happened when I made Pecan Chewies from my newest cookbook "South Your Mouth", authored by one of my best blog buddies, Mandy Rivers, who blogs over at South Your Mouth! These bars knocked my socks off! My parents dropped by shortly after the bars had cooled, and pretty much knocked their socks off too! Being Mandy is from South Carolina, I thought it was appropriate to use my special stash of South Carolina pecans that my friend Missy has me supplied with! I honestly would not change one thing about this recipe, they were perfectly buttery, nutty, delicious!

The other super cool thing going on? I get to giveaway one of these cookbooks to one lucky reader! I am so excited to share this cookbook with you. I LOVE Mandy's recipes. Her name is so common in our house, you would think she was a neighbor.  Truckin' Man will ask what's for dinner... my answer "Potato Goulash". He will raise an eyebrow at that and I tell him not to worry, "It's one of Mandy's recipe's". Once he knows it's her recipes, he asks no further questions!

Mandy is a mom on the move, so she has lots of family friendly recipes. I have yet to find her use an ingredient that I can't easily find, and livin' where I live, shopping can sometimes be a challenge!

To enter this giveaway, leave a comment with your email address. If you prefer, you can email me for your chance to win at sugarcookiestopeterbilts@yahoo.com

Deadline: Saturday, July 26 11:59 pm CST
Winner: I will randomly choose a winner and announce it at the top of this post. The winner will also be notified via email; if the winner does not respond within 72 hours, another winner will be selected.

Pecan Chewies     (Source: South Your Mouth)

1 cup Butter, melted
1 cup Sugar
1 cup Brown Sugar
2 eggs
2 teaspoon vanilla
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 tablespoon baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
1 1/2 cups chopped pecans

Preheat oven to 300 degrees. Grease a 9x13 pan. Set aside.

In large bowl, cream together melted butter (cooled back to room temp), sugar, brown sugar, eggs, and vanilla with mixer until smooth and creamy.

In another bowl, sift together flour, baking powder, and salt.  Slowly add dry ingredients to butter mixture. Mixing until completely combined. Stir in pecans, mixing until they are evenly distributed through batter.

Spread batter evenly into prepared pan, and bake for 40-45 minutes, or until set in the middle. Once cooled, cut into bars and store in airtight container. 

Enjoy!!

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Cake Cookie Bars

Remember all those recipe cards I showed you a week or two ago that my mom had passed along for me? I am still in the process of sorting.  I ended up making a category of "Need to try soon"! I didn't think there was anything wrong with that category.

First up, Cake Cookie Bars. The name had me curious, plus it had all ingredients I had on hand, except one optional one. Mom did have that you could use crushed toffee bars in the topping, which I think would be a great addition, but I used chocolate chips. These bars are great! They are a little bit cake, and a little bit cookie, and a whole lotta bar!  Easy to throw together. Fun, different, and they are definitely a tasty treat. I especially loved them since they aren't overly sweet.

Make a pan of these bars .... You won't be sorry!

Cake Cookie Bars

2 cups brown sugar, packed
2 cups flour
1/2 cup butter, room temperature
1 egg
1 tsp. salt
1 tsp. soda
1 tsp. vanilla
1/2 cup chopped nuts
1 cup chocolate chips (or substitute crushed toffee bars)
1 cup mini chocolate chips
1 cup milk

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease 9 x 13 pan, set aside.

In large bowl, mix together brown sugar, flour, and butter; mixing until thoroughly combined. Reserve one cup of mixture. In medium bowl, beat egg. To egg, add salt, soda, vanilla, and milk. Add egg mixture to large bowl. Mix until dry ingredients are completely incorporated into the egg mixture.

Pour batter into pan. Top with reserved cup of crumbs. Sprinkle nuts and chocolate chips over top.  Bake for 30 to 35 minutes. Bars are done when toothpick inserted in center comes out clean.

Enjoy!

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Pumpkin Roll Bars

Once fall arrives and we start having all the yummy fall flavors, I wish that I would treat us to them more often year round. This year, I made my own pumpkin puree, maybe that will spread the flavor through the year more? It really was so simple to make the puree, I will be doing that again!

Of course, after doing all that work making the puree, I wanted to try it, but on what? There were so many other desserts being shared for Thanksgiving, and we can only eat so much! After bringing home some office leftovers of a pumpkin roll, and Truckin' Man going crazy over that, I knew what direction I was going to head for a recipe. Pumpkin Roll Bars, I had just read about them over at The Recipe Critic.  Even though a pumpkin roll is easy (or so I am told), these were so simple. And they were sooo good! Pumpkiny goodness, with a cream cheese layer baked in, what more could you ask for? Of course, Truckin' Man loved them. He had a lot of driving to do last week, so I packed up a bunch for him to take with him.

Pumpkin Roll Bars (Source: The Recipe Critic)

6 T. unsalted butter, melted
1 1/2 c. granulated sugar
2 large eggs
1 15 oz. can pumpkin or 15 oz of fresh pumpkin puree
1 t. vanilla 
1/4 c. water
2 c. all purpose flour
2 t. ground cinnamon
1/2 t. ground cloves
1/2 t. ground ginger
1/2 t. ground nutmeg
1 t. baking soda
1/2 t. baking powder
1/4 t. salt

Cream Cheese Filling
8 oz. cream cheese, softened
1/4 c. granulated sugar
1/2 t. vanilla
1 large egg

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Spray a 9 x 13 inch baking pan with non-stick cooking spray. In a bowl, with electric mixer on medium speed, beat butter and 1 1/2 cups sugar until smooth. Beat in 2 eggs, pumpkin, 1 teaspoon of vanilla and water until well blended. In a separate bowl, mix flour, cinnamon, cloves, ginger, nutmeg, baking soda, baking powder, and salt; add the dry ingredients to the pumpkin mixture and combine until well blended. Spread 2/3 of the batter evenly into the prepared pan.

In another bowl, beat cream cheese, 1 egg, 1/4 cup sugar, and ½ teaspoon of vanilla until smooth. Spread cream cheese mixture evenly over the pumpkin batter. Dollop the remaining pumpkin batter over the cream cheese batter and spread out as evenly as possible. With a  knife, swirl together the cream cheese and top layer of pumpkin batter. Bake for 30-35 minutes, or until the center of the pumpkin batter springs back when touched. Cool completely in pan, then cut into bars.

Enjoy :) 

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Foodie Friends Friday - Celebrate Fall

Blackberry Pie Bars

Blackberries are ready!! I have been so looking forward to our season of berries and trying a new recipe! I went to pick berries the other day, and made the mistake of sitting my bowl down for a few minutes while multi-tasking. Mistake. I went back to the berries, and the chickens found my bowl of berries, and ate all but two of the berries. Not the end of the world, but I had a lot of berries picked already! No worries though, I picked enough to get back inside and debate what recipe to try!

After browsing through bunches of cookbooks, scouring pinterest, and poking around facebook, I decided on this recipe from Joy the Baker.  I am so glad I did.  It was simple, and so tasty!!! I did reduce her original amount of berries by one cup, out of laziness on not wanting to pick more berries. We ended up really liking the amount of berries to the amount of crust and topping.

Blackberry Pie Bars (Adapted from Joy the Baker)

Crust and Topping

3 c. all-purpose flour

1 1/2 c. sugar

1/4 t. salt

1 1/2 c. chilled unsalted butter, cut into cubes

zest of two lemons

Blackberry Filling

4 large eggs

2 c. sugar

1 c. greek yogurt

3/4 c. all-purpose flour

pinch of salt

*5 c. fresh black berries  or 2 16-oz  packages frozen blackberries, defrosted and drained

Crust and topping-

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.  Grease 9 x 13-inch backing pan.  Zest two lemons. Measure the sugar onto a clean work area.  Rub the lemon zest into the sugar with the back of a spoon (this will create a lemon scented sugar). 

Combine lemon sugar, flour, salt and butter in an electric mixer with a paddle attachment.  Beat the ingredients on medium speed until the mixture looks dry and crumbly.  Reserve 1 1/2 cups of crust mixture to use as the topping.  Press the remaining mixture into the bottom of the pan.  Bake the crust for 12 to 15 minutes until it is golden brown.  Let cool for 10 minutes while you make the filling.

Filling-

Whisk eggs in a large bowl.  Add sugar, greek yogurt, flour and salt.  Gently fold in the blackberries.  Spoon the mixture evenly over the crust. 

Sprinkle the reserved crust mixture evenly over the filling.  Bake for 50 to 60 minutes until the top is lightly browned.  Cool for 1 hour before slicing.

**Note - Add up to 6 cup of fresh berries depending on your taste.


Printable Recipe


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Frosted Peanut Butter Fingers

I was flipping through a cookbook the other day and found this recipe that used to be one of my favorites to make. Somehow, I had forgotten about it. How does that happen to such a good recipe? Especially one with chocolate and peanut butter?! I was a little disappointed in myself for letting such a thing happen. 

I did of course, get them made, and was so happy. It is such a peanut butter delight! It was the first time for Truckin' Man to try these bars, and let me tell you, he was a fan! The oatmeal layer has a lovely texture, topped with the smooth peanut butter, and finally the chocolate frosting! Yum!

Frosted Peanut Butter Fingers  (Adapted from Taste of Home)

1 c. butter, softened

1 1/2 c. packed brown sugar

1 c. sugar

2 1/2 c. creamy peanut butter, divided **Please see note below

1 egg

1 1/2 t. vanilla extract

2 1/2 c. oats (Quick cooking or regular)*

2 c. all purpose flour

1 t. baking soda

1/2 t. salt

Frosting

3 T. butter, softened

2 c. confectioners' sugar

1/4 c. baking cocoa

1/2 t. vanilla extract

3 to 4 T. milk

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  In a mixing bowl, cream the butter and sugars.  Add 1 cup of peanut butter, the egg, and vanilla; mix well.  In separate bowl, combine the oats, flour, baking soda and salt; add to the creamed mixture.  Spread into a greased 15" x 10" baking pan.

Bake at 350 for 13-17 minutes, or until golden brown.  Cool slightly on a wire rack, about 10 minutes. Then spread with the remaining peanut butter. Now, cool completely.

In a mixing bowl, combine the butter, confectioners' sugar, cocoa, vanilla and enough of the milk to get the frosting to the spreadable consistency.  Spoon over the peanut butter layer, then spread. 

*Note: You can use regular or quick cooking oats, but I like the texture better when using regular.

**I have found a note on this recipe stating generic or reduced-fat peanut butter is not recommended for this recipe. I have not tested this, and usually use Jif or Planters Peanut Butter.

Enjoy :)

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Lemon Brownies

I feel like I have been getting really stuck in some food ruts lately, so I am challenging myself this month to get out of the ruts and try some new recipes and ingredients.

Another goal for this season is to start using more fresh herbs. I can grow almost any herb this season, so I want to learn how to use them and take advantage of them. More to follow on this goal and challenge for myself.

This week, in my baking, I was breaking away from the chocolate and peanut butter routine, and experimenting with a couple lemon recipes. I had a lemon cookie failure, that was probably more the fault of my oven than the baker :) Then success with lemon brownies! These are such a nice change of pace. Bright lemony flavor. Quick and easy. 

Lemon Brownies  (source Rita's Recipes)

3/4 c. flour

3/4 c. sugar

1/4 t. salt

1/2 c.butter, soft

2 eggs

juice from 1/2 lemon (about 1T)

zest from 1/2 lemon (about 1t)

Glaze

1/2 c. powdered sugar

1 T lemon juice

additional lemon zest

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Grease 8 x8 baking pan.  Combine the flour, sugar and salt in a large bowl. Mix in the softened butter. In another bowl, whisk eggs with the lemon juice and zest. Add to the larger bowl and mix well.

Pour into prepared 8X8 pan. Bake for 25 minutes. Remove from oven and let cool.  

Mix together powdered sugar, lemon juice, and zest.  Pour over brownies.